00:00Cucumbers are almost magical. I find them truly amazing how they grow and the many
00:06ways you can grow them. This is just one way that you can also grow them outside on the ground.
00:12It's
00:13actually much easier. You don't have to prune them or anything or take any side shoots out
00:18and just wait for the cucumbers to develop. Then the biggest tip I would give you for that is
00:23don't plant them too early. Cucumbers love warmth. And that's one reason I've got them in here.
00:31Polytunnel. This is Southwest England zone eight, but the summers are not normally hot.
00:36Our average summer temperatures are 70s. This year we've been in the 90s quite a few times.
00:42That's low 30 centigrade. Oh boy, it's been challenging for cucumbers because we planted
00:48these on the 18th of May and it was cold and they had fleece over. They don't like that.
00:53And then within 10 days, it had turned incredibly hot, like 34 degrees centigrade, 93 Fahrenheit.
00:59And here it was close to 40 centigrade, over 100. Flipping out. And I was dousing them with a little
01:05bit of new water every day in the middle of the day, as well as in the morning, just to
01:11stop the
01:11growing points frazzling in incredible heat and sunshine. Because at that time when they're young,
01:17the root system has not fully developed and they're wanting to grow fast, but they can't keep
01:23up with the sun and the warmth and the roots can't supply them with enough moisture. That's just a
01:29fade back in the early summer. Now we've got through that. They've got a strong root system
01:34and they're well established. Every so often I'm losing a leader. And again, it's to do with,
01:39you know, even now mid August, we're having crazy temperatures as well. But I can show you a few
01:43things that I've learned along the way, even since the last video we filmed about how to grow cucumbers.
01:48It's on my channel. We'll put a link in the description. It's got more detail about it.
01:53This is a few extra things I've learned since then, like picking them, pruning them.
02:01You can see here's a beautiful cucumber. You can pick these. These are cordon cucumbers or English
02:07cucumbers. They grow vertically up a string, which is buried in the planting hole and just tied loosely
02:14at the top. And as they grow, I'm growing these for sale. So I want, I want cucumbers that look
02:22pretty much perfect. Slight blemish there, but this one will pass because it's such a good size.
02:28So I'm harvesting them at this stage, but you don't have to let them get that big. You know,
02:34you could harvest at that stage if you want. It's how you like them, really. But you will get more
02:41to eat if you let them get a bit bigger. But don't feel there's any particular size or stage you
02:45have
02:45to aim for. I am because I'm selling, that's all. And actually one like this, I'm going to cut it
02:54off
02:55probably to compost. So if I didn't have enough cucumbers to eat, I would eat that. But do you see
02:59how it's slightly deformed? And believe it or not, most customers don't like that. So sadly,
03:06like I say, that's edible, but there's only so many you can eat. Well, I might, I'll put it in
03:11my
03:11picking bucket and give it away. And then after this picking, I'm taking off some lower leaves
03:19and I'm doing it by using my thumbnail quite a bit, twisting, cutting with my nail, but not with a
03:26knife.
03:28And the reason for that is cucumbers get a virus called cucumber mosaic virus.
03:34And I think using my knife on several cucumbers consecutively around, there were 35 plants here,
03:41it's spreading the virus. I think, you know, I'm kind of guessing a bit, but doing it this way,
03:47you know, often then wiping my fingers and that. I don't think it's spreading it so much because last
03:52year from the 36 plants I put in, only eight survived by the end of June. The virus spread
04:00really fast. It ravaged most of the plants. This year in late May, I started to see it,
04:07slightly mottled leaves on two or three plants up there. I took out two of them straight away,
04:13thought I'll just keep the third one in and keep an eye on it. It didn't improve. So that one
04:17also
04:17I took out and I've been doing this way of pruning the leaves and 25 out of 36 plants have
04:25survived.
04:25And the ones that haven't is mostly to do with heat, incredible heat. So this is a success for me.
04:33And that's why I want to share with you some of these tips. In terms of twisting them around,
04:40it's just a gentle, fairly firm rotation around the string. And something else I do at the top is
04:49remove every second cucumber. So there's a gap there. You've got one there. Also, I'll leave that
04:58one, but remove the side shoot. And then here I'm going to take out or remove the tendril. So you
05:04can
05:04see that cucumber I'm removing together with its side shoot, because there's only so many of these
05:12amazing large cucumbers that a plant can support and leaving all of them on means the plant will
05:20give you a fantastic harvest, followed by none at all for about two foot length, 60 centimeter of stem,
05:28because it's kind of recovering. And I'm growing these organically. I'm not using any feed or fertilizer
05:33at all. All these had was the initial dose of compost in late April, which was actually quite a bit
05:39of
05:39well-rotted horse manure. That's really good. Any kind of well-rotted organic matter. And that's long-term
05:45soil food, but it's not rapid. It's not like junk food, fast food, which is what fertilizer is really
05:51in soil. So you haven't got an endless store of a rapid supply of nutrients, which for these to crop
05:59on every node would be what they would need. I don't want to go there because I'm getting fantastic
06:03results without that, as long as I don't ask too much of the plants. And then here's one more idea.
06:09This plant did recently lose its leader. It got frazzled in some heat. It's related to how much
06:18water I'm giving. I'm using this automatic watering system spray line, and it's not even. And some of
06:23the plants are getting a bit less moisture and that is causing them to suffer. But here, this one has
06:30got its last cucumber now. And then I'm going to reduce the stem length because there's still time,
06:38mid-August for it to grow some more. So if I cut it here, that's now the main stem at
06:47the top,
06:47which I've cut off. This one can come out. It's very tightly wrapped.
06:57I was hoping a side shoot or sucker would appear higher up, but it hasn't. It's there. So that can
07:07be
07:07the new leader all being well. I treat them very gently at first or they snap off the main stem.
07:13And there's quite a few here, actually, where that has happened. I can't see one right at the moment,
07:17but it's a constant vigilance with these plants. They are somewhat fragile, but they're also
07:27incredibly productive. And here's another one ready to harvest.
07:32Yeah. This morning, there are eight cucumbers here ready to harvest from the 26 plants. And
07:37yesterday I picked about six to give you an idea. Here also is one that's not going to make it.
07:46And
07:46I think that's to do with the feeding that I mentioned that the plant can't get quite enough
07:51food to always grow the cucumbers I was hoping for. So I'm taking that one out. That's compost.
07:59Whereas this one looks good. That's nice, even shape and strong. And it's looking further up here.
08:09Yeah, maybe I can't see an example. Sometimes you see ones that are looking a bit yellow,
08:16even when they're young. And those also I removed because the plant has already thought,
08:20no, I can't make that into a nice cucumber. So it's kind of constant vigilance getting, you know,
08:26getting really close to your plant. Actually, there's an example, that little cucumber there.
08:31Do you see how measly it is and going yellow compared to the one above it,
08:37which looks so strong with a nice flower on. So that one will make a nice cucumber. This one
08:42definitely won't. And this is what I was saying about, you know, they can't do it all the time on
08:48every node. But, you know, have a play, work things out, see what's working for you.
08:54I do recommend not using fertilizer, no dig. You build up a really strong soil biology,
09:00which is what helps the plants to feed. And one job less, no feeding or fertilizing,
09:05just a good dose, you know, up to two inches. But in this case, it was about one inch, three
09:11centimeters,
09:12of really well decomposed, high quality horse manure compost, and also some homemade compost we put
09:17on a bit. And on the pathways here, I'm putting a little bit of any old compost, not wood chip,
09:24green waste compost, in fact, because also the plants are rooting into the pathways as well.
09:29So have fun with cucumbers and try ridge cucumbers outside if you haven't got a structure like this,
09:37but, you know, they are such a versatile plant.
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